Buried at Sea?

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We get an email from the Australian Government website warning us that if we’re going to be in Slovenia for more than three days we need to register our presence with the local police. We’ve been here for eight days now, and this is the first we’ve known about this requirement. This is not good. We crossed the border when we arrived here without even slowing down, let alone showing anyone our passports, so I guess it’s possible the Slovenian authorities don’t know we’re here. We Google "police stations in Piran". The ten reviewers have given the one here an average of 1.8 stars, with comments including “incompetent gypsies”. Hmmm. We don’t particularly want to risk getting arrested so we decide to take our chances and just sneak back across the border tomorrow, and hope that no one notices.

We sit out on our cute little balcony and watch the world go by. We were hoping for another intense game of Slovenian Pavement Frisbee, but this morning “the world” just includes the local fire truck, which maybe doubles as an ambulance. We can’t see any smoke or obvious signs of people jumping helplessly from flaming upper storey windows; just two guys climbing calmly down from the cabin and heading off into a narrow alleyway with what look like medical bags in tow, so not too much drama there to report. We wondered yesterday about the significance of a couple of fishing boats next to each other in the harbour draped entirely in black flags. We haven’t noticed any cemeteries here, so maybe they bury everyone at sea, and the boats were just waiting for the next lot of bodies to turn up. Anyway fire truck guys come back a couple of hours later without any signs of trolleys with corpses on them, so maybe fishing boat funerals guys might have a quiet day in front of them. Either that or my imagination needs a rest day.

We spend the day doing very little. I head off for a quick dip and we then watch a spectacular sunset from the point. The local musicians are out in force, two young girls playing guitar and flute, and a guitarist/singer displaying his talents next to the mermaid statue on the point. They say music sparks emotions and memories, and this couldn’t be more true than here as our singer belts out excellent renditions of two of our favourites in succession, Pink Floyd’s “Wish You Were Here”, and Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game”.

We have our final Piran dinner in Tartini Square. Issy says that Slovenia has now overtaken Spain at the top of her list of world’s favourite countries, and it’s hard to argue. We’re very sad to be leaving.

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